Author's Note: Next week, this story will not be updated. Instead, I will post a oneshot crossover between Phantom of the Opera and the Nutcracker Ballet in honor of Christmas. It has nothing to do with this story, but I'd appreciate getting a few reviews; I think it's one of the better things I've written.

And now, back to our previously scheduled fic.


They made Nadir bring the girl to me, and he shakily read a speech about how I was being rewarded for my services…rewarded with a wife.

She was beautiful, slender and dark, with shining black hair, and she trembled like a rabbit before a fox.

Thoughts of Vasilida lurked in the back of my mind, but I pushed them away. She had found comfort elsewhere; certainly I could do so as well. If only the girl would not stare at me with such terror from behind her veil.

I reached out and pulled the veil off. She stared up at me, obviously petrified by fear.

"How old are you?" I demanded.

"Fifteen, master," she whispered. So young…how could I do such a thing as this?

"Have they told you what is expected of you?" I asked. A silly question for a harem girl, I suppose.

"Yes."

"Very well. I have seen what lies behind your veil, my dear…now you shall be accorded a reciprocal honor. Come forward and remove my mask."

She stared at me, horrified. Presumably she had seen me, maskless, on my visits to the khanum.

"To refuse me now is to refuse the shah himself," I reminded her. "If you resist I shall take you by force and then return you to execution at his hands. But only come to me willingly for this one night and I swear you shall go free at dawn. One night buys you the rest of your life and the means to spend it in honorable comfort. And perhaps, after all, that night will not be so terrible as you fear…"

I bent down, offering her my hand. She wept, hands together in a gesture of supplication.

"You would rather die than lie with me?" I asked, disbelieving. "You would truly rather die?"

She collapsed, sobbing, clutching at her arms. I could not do this. I could not rape a hysterical fifteen-year-old. But if she stayed here…if she stayed here, I would do it anyway.

"Take the child away," I ordered. The daroga, with a shocked look, rushed over.

"Apparently you have not understood the custom, Erik," he whispered urgently. "The girl is the shah's gift, a personal token of his esteem. To return her in this fashion would be counted an unforgivable breach of etiquette—an insult that would never be forgiven."

"Take her away," I repeated. "Tell the shah I have no use for nubile girls. Tell him I am…incapable…of using such a gift. Damn you, tell him whatever is necessary to ensure that she receives no punishment."

He made a sign, and the eunuch dragged the still-hysterical girl from the room. I poured myself some arrak, trembling but proud. I am not such a monster after all; despite everything, despite the hashish and the harem and all the efforts of the khanum, I am not truly a rapist.

At the same time, I felt more monstrous than ever. She wanted to die rather than sleep with me.

"You had better go," I told Nadir.

"I would like to talk to you first," he said.

"Yes," I sighed, "that is a right I cannot deny you—but I would be grateful for a few minutes of privacy now…just a few minutes alone…you understand?"

He nodded, and turned to leave. At the door, he paused.

"Erik…Vasilida and I have not...we haven't slept together since she found out that the idea of it upset you. I thought you might like to know that."

I turned to him, silently. Why would that be the case?

"You are a good man, Erik," he told me. Before I had a chance to argue, he left.


The khanum had the girl put into the torture chamber—my torture chamber—the next day. I could not watch, and I'm sure that my departure was unspeakably rude.

With that poor little girl's death, I suddenly lost my taste for killing. I could no longer conjure up images of those who had harmed me in the place of my victims; now, I saw her instead. Worse yet, sometimes I saw Vasilida. From what she had told me of her life, it was not much different from that of a harem girl. What could that poor fifteen-year-old have been, if she had managed to escape?

Perhaps a magician's apprentice.

Nadir warned me that retribution for my rudeness was a sure thing, and urged me to leave Persia, but I chose to ignore him. I had to finish the palace; otherwise, what would I have to show for my time in Persia? Countless deaths, and nothing more. Nothing.

I didn't ask him about Vasilida. I did not know why he had chosen to bring it up at that time; perhaps only to assure me that I was not the only one who would sleep alone that night.

I thought often of the time while I was sick, and my hallucinations of Vasilida. She had told me, in that dream, that she wasn't sleeping with Nadir any more; apparently that was true. Could the rest of it have been true?

It must have been a hallucination. How could she have said that she loved me?


My next visit with the khanum was less than cordial.

"You are so squeamish after all, my Angel of Death!" she crowed. "You were quick enough to violate your little Russian; why not that girl?"

"Madame, I was drugged," I stated through gritted teeth.

"Oh yes…silly me. How can I have forgotten? That makes it all better, of course. I don't understand why the silly thing left you."

I refused to answer. She leaned forward, her face almost touching the gauzy barrier that separated us.

"If you would like her back, you know, I can make it happen. You need only say the word, and she will be confined to your rooms. I won't even tell her that you asked me for that; you may convince her that I acted on my own, that you had nothing to do with it, if you'd like. I know she's fond of you; surely a clever fellow such as yourself can figure out a way to pry apart those legs without making her hate you, if that's so important to you."

I was nearly breathless with the picture she painted. Vasilida, taken away from the daroga and given to me…

She would be terribly unhappy, confined to my chambers. Even when she lived with me, she loved to go to the markets, or simply wander through the gardens.

"No, thank you," I told her. "I promise you, I will let you know if I want your assistance in procuring a female. Until then, kindly keep your offers to yourself."

"Well, Erik," she said, "If you don't want her, I am certain that someone does. Perhaps I will have her join my ladies here. She could entertain us with the magic you taught her, so that I don't have to call on you all the time."

"No!" I said, rather too quickly. "No. I do not think that is a good idea."

It was bad enough that she had slept with Nadir; at least he was a decent man, and treated her well. The thought of Vasilida as just another of the shah's many concubines…

"Very well," the khanum replied. "I will consider her under your protection. But know this; you will not always be here. The day you leave Persia will be the day that Vasilida joins our number."

"I do not plan to leave any time soon," I told her. Her smile was serpentine.

"I trust not."

After that, I was deaf to the daroga's suggestions that I leave the country before its rulers tired of me. I did not want to tell Vasilida that my obvious affection for her had put her in danger, and I would not risk condemning her to that life.

Still, I knew that the khanum's words were true. I would not remain in Persia forever. Somehow, I would have to get Vasilida to come with me when I left. I would have to tear her away from her happy life with Nadir, whether she was still sleeping with him or not.

Apparently, the khanum's dearest wish was to make Vasilida hate me.

God only knows why she didn't already.

"Do you hate me?"

"Never."

That was what she said, the first time that I visited her at the Khan household. "Never." She would never hate me.

I wished that I could believe that.

I did not tell her what the khanum had said.